Ashland Care Specialties introduces a bio-engineered peptide based on the skin's foundation (Actopontine biofunctional)

Ashland Care Specialties introduces a bio-engineered peptide based on the skin's foundation (Actopontine biofunctional)

PARIS, France - Ashland Care Specialties, a business unit of Ashland Specialty Ingredients, today announced Actopontine&#8482 biofunctional, a bio-engineered peptide designed to support skin's own production of a key protein called dermatopontin. Dermatopontin is believed to be one of the most important proteins necessary to rebuild the foundation of skin.  

Ashland's new offering is the first commercially available peptide demonstrated in vitro and ex vivo to increase the presence of a series of proteins known to facilitate the foundation of skin.

"Your skin is only as good as its foundation," said Anne Clay, marketing manager, skin care biofunctionals, Ashland Care Specialties. "Actopontine biofunctional is conceived as a potential pathway to help skin restore its foundational proteins that diminish with age and ultimately cause skin to sag and lose its critical collagen integrity. Actopontine biofunctional provides skin care formulators with an entirely new approach to resupplying the skin's extracellular matrix with the proteins it may require to enhance skin density and skin elasticity."

A collaboration of proteins
Skin's extracellular matrix consists of approximately 300 core proteins that interact to continually rebuild and remodel vital structural components. Dermatopontin is one of the key proteins - a glycoprotein - that binds with collagen and "collaborates" with other proteins to reinforce the foundational structure of skin. A protein normally synthesized by fibroblasts, dermatopontin is vital to a whole series of biological processes associated with normal skin. With aging and stress, however, these biological processes change, leading to a precipitous drop in type I collagen, fragmented collagen fibers and other deleterious effects.

Reversing collagen decline
Studies have shown that as aging occurs, type I collagen in consumers may decrease by as much as 68 percent between the ages of 30 and 80. TGF-?1 signaling is reduced, further decreasing the transcription of collagen genes. Senescent fibroblasts accumulate. Fibroblasts, in addition, resort to a mechanically relaxed shape, leading to less contact with collagen fibers and lower collagen production. Maintaining collagen, however, is essential to youthful-looking skin. Actopontine biofunctional has been associated in ex vivo studies with an increase in collagens I and III.

Enhancing collagen fibers
Boosting the presence of dermatopontin in skin ex vivo, Actopontine biofunctional supports collagen fibrillogenesis. Skin biopsy from a 35-year-old female showed that an area treated with Actopontine biofunctional exhibited significantly thicker and longer fibers than in an area without treatment, suggesting an increased quantity of dermatopontin located on a thicker network of collagen fibers.

Ex vivo laboratory studies have also indicated that Actopontine biofunctional may significantly enhance the presence of other proteins associated with the extracellular matrix, such as laminin-5, key to the structure of the dermal-epidermal junction; and integrin-α3 and fibronectin, two proteins known to play a role in remodeling the skin's matrix.

Cosmetic applications
Based on the results of in vivo and ex vivo testing, Ashland will support a range of cosmetic formulations, including anti-aging skin care products, formulations to advance skin firmness and elasticity, facial day and night creams and other body care formulations.

"Nurturing the normal biological processes associated with rebuilding and remodeling skin's extracellular matrix is one of the most practical yet innovative approaches to anti-aging skin care. Actopontine biofunctional is aimed at restoring a youthful look to skin by facilitating the skin's own production of dermatopontin, a key glycoprotein required to set in motion collagen and other proteins that, collectively, support skin's matrix," said Clay.

For more information about Ashland's offerings at in-cosmetics, visit Stand E31.

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About Ashland Specialty Ingredients
Ashland Specialty Ingredients, a commercial unit of Ashland Inc., offers industry-leading products, technologies and resources for solving formulation and product performance challenges in key markets including personal care, pharmaceutical, food and beverage, coatings and energy. Using natural, synthetic and semi-synthetic polymers derived from plant and seed extract, cellulose ethers and vinyl pyrrolidones, Ashland Specialty Ingredients offers comprehensive and innovative solutions for today's demanding consumer and industrial applications.

About Ashland
In more than 100 countries, the people of Ashland Inc. (NYSE: ASH) provide the specialty chemicals, technologies and insights to help customers create new and improved products for today and sustainable solutions for tomorrow. Our chemistry is at work every day in a wide variety of markets and applications, including architectural coatings, automotive, construction, energy, food and beverage, personal care, pharmaceutical, tissue and towel, and water treatment. Visit ashland.com to see the innovations we offer through our four commercial units - Ashland Specialty Ingredients, Ashland Water Technologies, Ashland Performance Materials and Ashland Consumer Markets.

Disclaimer: The information contained here and the various products described are intended for use only by persons having technical skill and at their own discretion and risk after they have performed necessary technical investigations, tests and evaluations of the products and their uses. This material is for informational purposes only and describes the scientific support for the use of the products described herein as an ingredient in cosmetic products intended to enhance appearance and other cosmetic benefits or to enhance performance of an end product. Certain end uses of these products may be regulated pursuant to rules governing medical devices or other regulations governing drug uses.  It is the purchaser's responsibility to determine the applicability of such regulations to its products.  While the information herein is believed to be reliable, we do not guarantee its accuracy and a purchaser must make its own determination of a product's suitability for purchaser's use, for the protection of the environment, and for the health and safety of its employees and the purchasers of its products.

Neither Ashland nor its affiliates shall be responsible for the use of this information, or of any product, method, formulation, or apparatus described in this brochure. Nothing herein waives any of Ashland's or its affiliates' conditions of sale, and no statement, information and data is to be taken as a guarantee, an express warranty, or an implied warranty of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose, or representation, express or implied, for which Ashland and its affiliates assume legal responsibility. We also make no warranty against infringement of any patents by reason of purchaser's use of any information, product, method or apparatus described in this brochure.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION:
Media Relations
Anna Gripp
+1 973-641-1724
agripp@ashland.com